guendee@phillynews.com
Dustin Diamond, famous for playing the character Screech Powers on 13-odd years of "Saved by the Bell" and its spinoffs (and notorious on a smaller scale for his sex tape, which was released in 2006 and was reportedly so disgusting that even battle-hardened veterans of Internet pornography were grossed out) is making another bid for renewed cultural relevance with a tell-all book, titled "Behind the Bell," about his days on on the show.
SatTatt admits that she is highly, in fact, rabidly curious (as, she suspects, will be every last non-Amish American between the ages of 20 and 29) about the details of the hinted-at "sexual escapades among cast members, drug use, and hardcore partying," apparently happening on-set while the show filmed. She hopes that Diamond and ghostwriter Alan Goldsher know their audience and skim over "Saved by the Bell: The New Class."
SatTatt would like to think that an appalling sex tape plus a ghostwritten memoir would not equal career resurgence, but it looks like it's worked for Diamond, as 2009 will see him doing some non-SbtB-related acting in a film version of Hamlet . . .
Oh, wait a second, that's "Hamlet A.D.D.", a movie out to answer the eternal question, "What if 'Hamlet' was reimagined as a sci-fi buddy comedy with a time-traveling, attention-deficient protagonist who just can't get around to avenging his father's death . . . and what if it were shot entirely on green screen?"
Diamond has a cameo in the first scene as Bernardo, a watchman who sees the ghost of Hamlet's father. Bernardo the watchman, in Shakespeare's version, has 19 lines.
Jolie commandos!
All is not well in the town of Brignoles.
If you've been following celebrity news, the place is instantly recognizable as the town in the French countryside where the Jolie-Pitt family has settled into their mansion after the birth of twins Knox Leon and Vivienne Marcheline earlier this month. The small town was chosen for its peacfulness and seclusion, but the stars seem to have brought their trouble with them.
Yesterday, the town's police department was still trying to sort out the details of a brawl between the couple's security force and two paparazzi so desperate for those first multimillion-dollar shots of the twins that they made a five-hour trek through the forest (while carrying all their equipment) to get a good angle on the Jolie-Pitt garden. When security guards discovered the intruders, a dustup occured, and now both sides are filing legal complaints accusing the other of battery and causing injury.
The paparazzi argue that the forest belongs to everyone, which is slightly surprising; SatTatt didn't know you could legally invoke Disney's "Pocahontas" in French courts.
The family's security team argues that not only were the photographers obviously trespassing on the couple's 1,235-acre property, but that their claims that nature belongs to us all were undercut by the fact that they had actually come in camouflage with provisions to camp out.
Meanwhile, the couple's neighbors are reportedly less than pleased about the circus that follows the Jolie-Pitt family. According to E! Online, many citizens are sick of their taxes going to protect the privacy of American celebrities. A group of citizens also has voiced their objections to the older children enrolling in the town's elementary school, saying that the paparazzi would ruin the school for the rest of the town's children.
Hopefully for the family, the furor will die down after the first pictures are released; the family has reportedly already made a deal with an American magazine. Which one and the amount of money paid for access are unreleased, but people in the business have estimated that they'll sell for between $10 and $20 million. *
